MSI RTX 5090 Lightning Z: Costs 5K, Pulls Over 1000W

1. Introduction2. Meet the MSI RTX 5090 Lightning Z3. Testing Methodology4. Game Benchmarks5. Clock Speed6. GPU Temperatures7. Acoustics8. Noise-Normalised Temperatures9. Power Draw and Efficiency10. Overclocking11. Closing Thoughts12. View All Pages

We take our noise measurements with the sound meter positioned 1 foot from the graphics card. I measured the noise floor to be 32 dBA, thus anything above this level can be attributed to the graphics cards. The power supply is passive for the entire power output range we tested all graphics cards in, while all CPU and system fans were disabled. A reading under load comes from running Cyberpunk 2077 for 30 minutes.

As for noise levels, considering there's no fan on the card itself, all the noise is down to the AIO. Using the OC BIOS we saw the fans running at 1220rpm, and that hit 35dba, whereas the Extreme BIOS is louder at 37dba, given the fans increased to 1490rpm. That means the Suprim Silent BIOS is still the quietest 5090 we've ever tested, but the Lightning Z is hardly loud and still quieter than the rest of the other 5090s.

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